The Pirate City by Robert Michael Ballantyne (large ebook reader .TXT) 📖

of action that was bold even for a British Admiral. He ran the _Queen Charlotte_ before the wind, close up to the walls, and with the sails still standing let go three anchors from the stern, so as to keep her exactly in the required position, just before the opening of the mole, and with her vast broadside _within pistol-range_ of the walls, flanking all the batteries from the mole-head to the light-house.

Still no shot was fired. The boldness of the act seemed to have confounded and paralysed the enemy, insomuch that a second ship of the line had almost taken her position close to the stern of her predecessor before the battle began. The effect on the minds of the combatants on both sides was so great that they seemed to have forgotten for an instant the dread work they were about to perform. The mole was crowded with troops, many of whom, with irresistible feelings of curiosity, leaped on the parapet to see the vessel pass, while Lord Exmouth, with a strange touch of humanity, waved to them earnestly to get out of the way of the coming fire!

Having coolly lashed the ship by a hawser to the main-mast of an Algerine brig which was attached to the shore, and stoppered the cables, the crew of the flag-ship cheered.

Immediately a gun was fired by the Algerines. At the first flash Lord Exmouth gave the order to "stand by."

At the second gun of the enemy he gave the word "Fire!"

The third was drowned in the thunder of the _Queen Charlotte's_ broadside.

The effect of such heavy metal at so short a range was terrific. The walls absolutely crumbled before it, and it is said that five hundred men fell at the first discharge. All the batteries of the city at once opened fire; the ships did likewise, as they successively got into position, and for some hours after that the roar of artillery was incessant, for, despite the irresistible fire of the fleet, the pirates stood to their guns like men. Thus, although the leading vessels succeeded in anchoring quietly, all the rest of the ships went into action under a very heavy fire, particularly that of the Dutch Admiral, who displayed great wisdom and gallantry in the part which he played. The line-of-battle ships formed in a sort of crescent round the outside of the island. The _Superb_ anchored two hundred and fifty yards astern of the flag-ship; the _Minden_ anchored about her own length from the _Superb_, and passing her stream-cable out of the larboard gun-room port to the _Albion_, brought the two ships together. Next came the _Impregnable_. These sufficiently engaged the batteries on the island or mole. The heavy frigates passed ahead and anchored,--the _Leander_ on the port bow of the _Queen Charlotte_, the _Severn_ ahead of her, with her starboard broadside bearing on the Fishmarket battery. The _Melampus_ and _Diana_, Dutch vessels, passed beyond and engaged the southern batteries of the town. The smaller vessels cruised about, directing their fire where it seemed to be most needed, and the flotilla of mortar and rocket boats were distributed at the openings between the line-of-battle ships and the mole.

This admirable disposition of the force seemed to inspire the men with additional confidence, if such were possible, but ere long the dense smoke rendered everything invisible beyond a few yards' distance from the actors in the tremendous fight.

In a few minutes after opening fire, the _Queen Charlotte_ had reduced the fortifications on the mole-head to ruins. She then brought her broadside to bear on the batteries over the gate leading to the mole and on the upper works of the light-house. Her shot told on it with fatal accuracy, crumbling the tower and bringing down gun after gun, thus proving that the ball-practice on the voyage out had not been undertaken in vain. Indeed, so expert did some of the gunners find themselves that they actually amused themselves at one part of the day in attempting to hit the Algerine flag-staff!

It chanced that, owing to some alteration in the arrangements, our friend Rais Ali was transferred from the battery on the walls, where he had originally been stationed, to that on the light-house, and when he beheld gun after gun tumbling helplessly over the crumbling parapets, his spirit fired, and he amazed his comrades by displaying a disregard of personal danger for which he had never before got credit. Whether it was that Ted Flaggan had underrated him, or that there is truth in the proverb about extremes meeting, we cannot tell, but certain it is, that when Rais Ali saw every gun of the battery dismounted but one, he rushed at that one like an enraged lion, seized the rammer from the man who wielded it, and began to load.

He might have spared himself the trouble, for before he got the charge rammed home, a shot from the terrible _Queen Charlotte_ struck the parapet just underneath, burst it up, and toppled the gun over. Rais leaped on the ramparts, waved his scimitar with a yell of defiance, and, tumbling after the gun, was lost amid a cloud of lime-dust and debris.

Strange to say, he rose from out the ruin almost unhurt, and quite undismayed.

Hasting along the quay without any definite end in view, he found the captain of the port getting the flotilla of gun-boats ready for action. There were thirty-seven of them, and up to that time they had lain as snugly in the harbour as was compatible with a constant shower of shells and rockets tumbling into them. With great daring the pirates had resolved to make a dash with these, under cover of the smoke, and attempt to board the British flag-ship.

"Where go you?" demanded the infuriated Rais.

The captain of the port hurriedly explained.

"I go with you," cried Rais, jumping into one of the boats; "it is fate--no man can resist the decree of fate."

All the boats pushed swiftly off together, and did it so silently that they were close under the bow of the flag-ship before being observed. The _Leander_ also saw them, and a few guns from her, as well as from the flag-ship, were instantly turned on them.

"Musha! look there!" cried Ted Flaggan, who chanced to be on the part of the ship nearest them.

A tremendous crash followed, and thirty-three out of the thirty-seven boats were in one moment sent to the bottom!

Of the four that escaped and put about to retreat, one came within the range of the gun at which Flaggan served. It was trained to bear.

"Fire!" said the captain.

"Howld on!" cried Ted, suddenly clapping his hand on the touch-hole, and receiving the red-hot poker on the back of it.

"What's that for, mate?" demanded the man who held the poker, as he quickly raised it.

"All right, me hearty; fire away," said Ted, as he quietly removed his hand.

Next moment the gun leaped back as if affrighted at its own vomit of shot, smoke, and fire, and a column of white foam rose from the sea, astern of the boat.

The momentary check had delivered it from destruction, and Ted Flaggan had the satisfaction of knowing that he had saved his friend Rais Ali, as he tenderly patted his injured hand.

More than an hour of this heavy firing failing to produce submission, Lord Exmouth resolved to destroy the Algerine fleet. The _Leander_ was ordered to cease firing, and the flag-ship barge, under Lieutenant Richards, was ordered to board the nearest frigate of the enemy, with laboratory torches and carcass shells. This duty was gallantly performed, and so effectually, that the men of the barge had barely time to tumble over the side when the frigate was a mass of flames. The barge was received with three hearty cheers on its return. Next, the launch of the _Queen Charlotte_ opened on the largest frigate in the port with carcass shells, and despite the frantic efforts of the Algerines to save her, she was soon completely on fire. From this frigate the fire spread to all the other boats and vessels in the harbour, and from these to the storehouses and arsenal, until the whole place was wrapped in smoke and flames.

Meanwhile the other ships had done terrible execution on the walls and houses immediately opposite to them, while the bomb-vessels threw their deadly missiles right over their own ships and into the town and arsenal, with tremendous effect.

Thus the work of destruction went on all the afternoon, while men, of course, fell fast on both sides--for the deadly game of war cannot be carried on except at fearful cost. Even in the secondary matter of _materiel_ the cost is not small. As night approached the guns of the enemy were completely silenced, and the ships began to husband their ammunition, for they had by that time fired an immense quantity of gunpowder, and 50,000 shot, weighing more than 500 tons of iron; besides 960 shells of large size, as well as a considerable quantity of shot, shell, and rockets from the flotilla! The result was that the entire fleet of the pirates was destroyed, and the sea-defences of Algiers, with a great part of the town itself, were shattered and crumbled in ruins.

Then the fleet hauled off with considerable difficulty, owing to the absence of wind; but the pirates had not given in, for they kept spitting at their foes from the upper batteries of the town until half-past eleven at night, when the ships got out of range and firing ceased.

Strange to say, the powers of nature, which had hitherto slumbered quietly, now came into play. The breeze freshened and a tremendous storm of thunder, lightning, and rain came on, as if to mock the fury of man, and humble him under a sense of his relative littleness.

But man is not easily humbled. Next morning the pirates still showed a disinclination to give in, and the British fleet resumed the offensive in order to compel them to do so.

The gun-boats were again placed in position, and Lieutenant Burgess was sent ashore with a flag of truce to demand unconditional surrender.


CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.


THE LAST.

In a dimly-lighted cell of a massive stone building not far from the palace of the Dey, sat Colonel Langley, Francisco Rimini and his two sons, Bacri the Jew, and the officers and men belonging to the _Prometheus_--all heavily ironed. The Padre Giovanni was also there, but not, like the others, a prisoner.

He was attending to his self-imposed duty of comforting the sick and dying. Among the other prisoners was an Italian slave, a nobleman, who had broken down on the ramparts and rebelled, and was sent to prison as being the most convenient hospital where he might be kept until the pirates should find leisure to flog him into submission or to death. But Death had a mind to do the work according to his own pleasure. The slave felt himself to be sinking, and, through the influence of Bacri with the jailer, he had been permitted to send for Giovanni. Other slaves were there too, doomed to punishment, or, in other words, to various degrees of torture. They lay or cowered around the cell awaiting the issue of the fight.

It was a terrible sight to see the varied expressions of anxiety, fear, or dogged